Theatre Production Goes On Despite Pandemic

In a sung-not-spoken announcement during virtual Chapel this past spring, students and faculty learned that the musical Godspell was slated to be the fall 2020 theatre performance. Newly hired Director of Theatre Chris Briante was excited to head the production as it represented the first school musical in a number of years. As the realities of returning to school became clearer over the summer, Briante realized a musical production wouldn’t be feasible, and sought out a show that could be rehearsed and performed within the School’s health guidelines. Caryl Churchill’s Love and Information ended up being a perfect fit. Not only was Briante familiar with the work, but it allowed for flexibility in casting and less density on stage.

“Most scenes have just two characters with the most people on stage at one time being four,” he says.

The play itself consists of 48 short scenes (what Churchill calls “micro-dramas”), ranging in length from 45 seconds to four or five minutes. There is no plotline that ties the micro-dramas together, but all the vignettes can loosely be categorized as dealing with either “love” or “information.” Another factor that inspired Briante to select the play was the fact that much of the character development work comes from the actors/actresses and not the playwright.

“Churchill gives us very little information about the characters,” says Briante. “She gives us the dialogue, but the students created the relationships. I like for students to take ownership of the material and this was the perfect piece to be able to achieve that.”

One example of this came in a scene called “Message,” where one person is pressing another on how extreme the reaction should be to the oppression of their particular ethnic group. Churchill penned the scene in response to the violence displayed by ISIS at the time (around 2010), but the students in the SPS rendition made police brutality the focus of the micro-drama. Even with the differing subject matter, the original dialogue was a spot-on match.

COVID-induced production obstacles were omnipresent but never daunting, forcing Briante and the cast to get creative when it came to blocking, staging, and even hand sanitizing mid-production. While there was a two-week window where cast members were allowed to rehearse mask-free, actors ultimately wore masks for both productions, and played to a house of 50 masked-and-distanced patrons, down from the usual 150-person New Space capacity.

“I tried to tell the students, ‘We are very fortunate, even with our masks on, to be able to, as a school, get the support that we’ve gotten,’” says Briante. “I’m proud of what they were able to accomplish.”

The Winter Term production will feature the student one-act plays, and a musical revue, featuring selections from Godspell, is slated for the Spring Term.